Sliding into the New Year (With a Little Rearranging)

We had a quiet and uneventful Christmas holiday, thanks for asking. It was just what we always wanted. And while I've got a few stray boxes yet to be packed in storage, most of the holiday riff-raff has been put away until next December. 

I wish I could say I'm prepared for 2014's launch, but I'm sitting here in pajamas at 11 a.m. on a Friday morning, I appear to be so behind on laundry that I can't find a clean pair of pants, and I really NEED pants today because it was -5 degrees Fahrenheit at dawn this morning. This is not cute skirt weather, even with cute sweater leggings and cute boots, all of which I have. 

What I'm saying is that readers are getting a blog post because I'm waiting on the washer and dryer, and clean pants. Clearly I have very high performance standards. 

I'll be following up soon with a New Year's/New goals/Famous last words type post in a bit, but in the meantime, here's something I did while I was waiting for my cookies to bake and my holiday plans to gel: I rearranged the dishes in my dining room built-ins. 

I get in this attitude that if a room is in transition, why bother with the niceties? And my dining room has been in that place for a long time-- fleshy beiges, tacky 80s vinyl wallpaper, furniture I no longer like. There was one other picture I was going to share, but decided showing blog readers a photo of a dining room with an ironing board in it looked too much like a stage set from the old television show Hee-Haw. But this is where I am with this space: 

I'm beginning to change my feeling about this. Even with wallpaper half-peeled, doesn't shambling disorder make the situation even worse? Why would I completely ignore this room if I walk through it every day going from the living room to the kitchen?

This is the east built-in cabinet, with stacks of various dishes, paint chips, and some odds and ends I didn't want to lose track of: 

And this is the west built-in, which looks even sadder to me, somehow. 

It's the land of Misfit Tableware, orphaned gravy boats and all. 

It was bugging me as I was doing my annual holiday foofing and baking, so I took half an hour to clean everything out of there, put away, and rearrange. 

Here are my afters. First, the east built-in: 

And here is the west built-in: 

These corner cabinets were about 15 percent of my decision to buy this house. Call me superficial, but it was love at first sight. Even so, they need a fresh coat of paint, and that wallpaper insert taken off the lower door panel. I'd like to do something with color/wallpaper/shelf-liner in the inside, but have no ideas yet. 

Still, just tidying up in both made the room feel just a little better. Incremental improvements are a way of making me feel like there's progress until I find the time, energy, and money for the big bang efforts. 

Here's hoping there are a few of those big bang efforts in 2014. Oh, and clean pants.